Yeah, Paco and Cowboy Neal are two of them. Since Cowboy Neal's home node has been around since 1999, it appears this gag has been here for a while. Watch the upper right corner of the Perlmonks pages. The next time you see the guy with a bird on his hat, do a mouseover.

Of course, unless you're one of the Illuminati you'll never fully understand, so just go along wth it.